Article published Online by the Israeli Newspaper
Ha´aretz, Internet Edition, 7th April 2003:
Background: AIPAC and the Iraqi
opposition
By Nathan
Guttman
WASHINGTON - An unusual visitor was invited
to address the annual conference held last week in Washington by
AIPAC, the pro-Israeli lobby in the United States: the head of the
Washington office of the Iraqi National Congress, Intifad Qanbar. The
INC is one of the main opposition groups outside Iraq, and its
leaders consider themselves natural candidates for leadership
positions in the post-Saddam Hussein era. Qanbar's invitation to the
conference reflects a first attempt to disclose the links between the
American Jewish community and the Iraqi opposition, after years in
which the two sides have taken pains to conceal them.
The considerations against openly disclosing the extent of
cooperation are obvious - revelation of overly close links with Jews
will not serve the interests of the organizations aspiring to lead
the Iraqi people. Currently, at the height of rivalry over future
leadership of the country among opposition groups abroad, the
domestic opposition and Iraqi citizens, it is most certainly
undesirable for the Jewish lobby to forge - or flaunt - especially
close links with any one of the groups, in a way that would cause its
alienation from the others.
"At the current stage, we don't want to be involved in this
argument," says a major activist in one of the larger Jewish
organizations.
In the end, Intifad Qanbar did not attend the AIPAC conference.
At the last moment, he was asked by the American administration to go
to northern Iraq to help organize opposition to Saddam there. In his
place, another well-known opposition activist spoke to the
conference, Kana Makiya, who is less identified with the Iraqi exile
organizations.
The Jewish groups maintain quiet contacts with nearly every Iraqi
opposition group, and in the past have even met with the most
prominent opposition leader, Ahmed Chalabi. The main objective was an
exchange of information, but there was also an attempt to persuade
the Iraqis of the need for good relations with Israel and with world
Jewry.
"You have to be realistic about your aims," says one Jewish activist.
"You have to understand that Iraq will be an Arab state, and that it
won't want to adopt a controversial foreign policy."
Nevertheless, the Jewish activists make it clear they do expect the
future Iraqi regime to obligate itself not to be aggressive toward
Israel and adopt the mainstream view of the Arab world, "perhaps
something like the position taken by Saudi Arabia or the Gulf
states," says the activist.
Sources in the Jewish community noted last week that while Chalabi's
people expressed positive opinions vis-a-vis Israel in conversations
with Jews, Adnan Pachachi, another opposition leader who recently
founded an opposition movement that competes with the Iraqi National
Congress, said last week in London that he does not expect good
relations between the new Iraq and Israel, as this would be
antithetical to Iraqi interests.
Prayer for soldiers
Colin Powell addressing AIPAC, which,
like the secretary of state, has been working on quiet
contacts with exiled politicos expected to shape post-war
Iraq.
|
Aside from the annual AIPAC conference, two other major events in
the United States last week underscored the gamut of opinions and
perspectives in the American Jewish community on the war. The
positioning of the AIPAC people to the right of the coalition forces
and to those who sent them is not surprising. AIPAC is wont to
support whatever is good for Israel, and so long as Israel supports
the war, so too do the thousands of the AIPAC lobbyists who convened
in the American capital.
There is no such uniformity among the various religious Jewish
movements, and indecisiveness is still very much the case. In Los
Angeles, members of the Conservative movement's Rabbinical Assembly
gathered and tried to clarify their position on the war. The 350
rabbis shelved the discussions that were on the original program, and
devoted all of their time to the question of whether they were for or
against the war. In the end, the issue was submitted to an executive
council, which issued a draft resolution that offered support for the
war, albeit with reservations.
"Judaism affirms the permissibility of war as a response to
life-threatening aggression, current or anticipated," read the
statement drafted by the Conservative rabbis, who confirmed that they
were in agreement with the idea of a preemptive war such as the one
declared by President Bush. The movement's rabbis also expressed
support for the efforts of coalition forces to remove the threat of
terror and nuclear weapons, and expressed support for the soldiers
themselves. The movement qualified this by stating that Judaism
"affirms the supreme value of peace and peacemaking," although it
could accept wars conducted for the purposes of defense.
The rabbis also called for "continued restraint" in conducting
actions among civilian populations and for harming non-combatants to
be avoided as much as possible.
Nevertheless, the Conservative movement went through its share of
trial and tribulation before reaching this draft resolution. Before
the war and in its initial days, Rabbi Ismar Schorsch, the chancellor
of the Jewish Theological Seminary, the movement's primary
educational institution, was one of the most prominent spokesmen
against the war. The U.S. was entering an "era of darkness," he said,
adding the war was motivated by political, not defensive, aims.
Once the war began, however, Rabbi Schorsch took a step back. In a
New York Times article, he declared that he did not want to criticize
the war at a time when soldiers were engaged in combat. Many viewed
this as a restatement of his views.
To a great extent, the approach taken by Schorsch reflects the path
taken by the Conservative movement. Despite the wide diversity of
opinions within the movement on the eve of the war, and the numerous
reservations voiced, as soon as combat began, those with criticism
opted to declare their support and minimized their criticism. The
resolution approved in Los Angeles last week is a product of this
process.
The dilemma is more pronounced among Reform Jews. They also convened
last week to formulate a joint position, and they too were careful
not to launch any strident criticism of the war itself. The Reform
movement is considered the home of liberal Jewry, and its membership
is thought to be people who were the driving force of the civil
rights movement of the `60s. It was not surprising, therefore, that
the Democratic members of Congress who came to address the
conference, including Senator Edward Kennedy and House Minority
Leader Nancy Pelosi, were received with thunderous applause. The sole
Republican representative, Congressman Eric Cantor, sufficed with a
modicum of polite applause.
Sharp criticism was voiced from the podium at President Bush on a
variety of issues, but criticism of the war in Iraq did not take
central stage.
"While there is a spectrum of views in the Reform movement on the
Iraq war, there is a consensus that it does not take the place of all
the other wars - against poverty, hatred and exploitation," said
Rabbi Eric Yoffie, president of the Union of American Hebrew
Congregations.
The only decision relevant to the war was agreement on a prayer for
the welfare of the soldiers at the front, and recognition of the fact
that there are a variety of opinions on the war. The resolution that
was adopted is very far from constituting an expression of support of
any kind for the war, but is also far from constituting criticism of
it.
The situation is simpler among the Orthodox. Immediately upon the
outbreak of the war, the Orthodox Union, the umbrella organization of
the community, released a statement that expressed unequivocal
support for President Bush and his decision to launch the war on
Iraq, which was described as having "noble aims."
So far, the only poll that has been sought to gauge Jewish opinions
on the war - conducted a month before it broke out - found that 56
percent of Jews were supportive of the war. The rate is said to be
even higher now, corresponding to increased support for the war among
the American populace in general.
Secret relations with Saudi
Arabia
Last week, the United States decided to alter the flight paths of its
Tomahawk cruise missiles, which had been passing above Saudi Arabia,
in response to Saudi complaints that four of the missiles had fallen
in its territory and endangered residents of the kingdom. A similar
request was voiced by Turkey, after it developed that the IQ of some
of the smart bombs was not high enough for them to find their way to
Baghdad, and they landed on Turkish soil.
The Saudi request to cease firing the missiles above its territory is
illustrative of a fact that all of the sides are trying to conceal -
that from the outset Saudi Arabia agreed to place its air space at
the disposal of the Americans for the purpose of launching missiles
at Iraq from ships in the Red Sea.
Saudi Arabia is the hidden player in the American war on Iraq. Prior
to the outbreak of combat, it made it publicly clear that it opposed
the war and declared that it would not cooperate with the Americans.
As opposed to the first Gulf War, in which Saudi Arabia was a major
partner and a main base of departure for the military forces in Iraq,
it is now sitting on the sidelines, ostensibly uninvolved.
Nevertheless, well-informed American sources report that the two
countries agreed it would be better to obscure the military
cooperation between the two sides, which have reached agreement to
allow America to exploit many of Saudi Arabia's strategic assets.
The trajectory of the cruise missiles above Saudi Arabia is but one
example. It is further charged that the Saudis are also permitting
the United States to use Saudi air space for intelligence flights and
that the main U.S. Air Force base in Saudi Arabia is assisting by
providing flight control of the aircraft conducting bombing missions
in Iraq. This American base was supposed to play a major role in the
war, and serve as a home base for most of the bombing sorties, but in
the early stages of preparations for war about six months ago, the
Saudis made it clear they would not permit the Americans to take off
from Saudi soil to bomb Saddam. However, once the crisis atmosphere
faded somewhat, the Americans realized it would be possible to reach
quiet understandings with the Saudis. One if them is that while
America would not take off from Saudi Arabia, it would be able to use
its air space, and provide flight control from its territory.
Another understanding has to do with oil. American war planners
feared that one of the immediate repercussions of the war would be a
steep spike in oil prices, due to both the suspension of albeit
limited Iraqi oil exports (of 1.7 million barrels a day) and the
generally nervous wartime market. In this case, Saudi Arabia again
entered the picture. Many weeks before the first shot was fired in
the Gulf, the Saudis stepped up the pace of oil production in order
to compensate for a possible shortage, reaching a rate of production
higher than anything in the past 20 years.
The United States is buying up the surplus and laying in a stockpile,
while simultaneously ensuring that world oil prices remain stable.
When the war ends, the U.S. and Saudi Arabia will again be able to
out their relationship from the closet.
One American source declared that the American public would be
surprised to discover just how critical was the Saudi contribution to
the American war effort. The kingdom is not enjoying much support
from American public opinion. On the day after, Washington and Riyadh
will have to find a way to overcome the other obstacles that have
hurt relations of the two countries in the past two years: the
attitude toward Crown Prince Abdullah's peace plan, the issue of
Saudi cooperation in the terror investigations, and the continued
massive presence of American soldiers on Saudi soil.
